Originally Posted by
ajax
Ah! Thanks, I didn't know that the three-year rule only applied to spouses of British nationals - I thought it was all EEA nationals.
The UKBA page (in its typical maddening vagueness) seems to imply that you do not need a year of ILR as well before applying for naturalisation on the basis of being the spouse of a non-British EEA national - rather, that you only need five years' worth of residency:
http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/br...tnerofcitizen/
The following excerpt does not specify nationality of the sponsoring spouse/CP:
As I understand it (and I agree that the UKBA page is in places quite delightful in its vagueness), if you are the spouse of civil partner of a British citizen, the qualifying period of residence is 3 years and you must be settled (i.e., in this case, with indefinite leave to remain) in the UK on the date that you make your application for naturalisation.
For all others, the qualifying period is 5 years to gain settled status (indefinite leave to remain, or permanent residence if EU/EEA) and you must have held that status for 1 year before applying, making 6 years in total. (The exception to this 6 years would be people who are not British citizens but who have the right of abode in the UK, since they are deemed settled from the moment they arrive in the UK. They therefore do not need to wait the extra year.)
The reason for this apparent mismatch and the extra year is that the previous government, in its wisdom, altered the legislation in such a way that the requirements for settled status and the requirements for naturalisation became "uncoupled" from each other. Whether the intention was in fact to extend the period needed to be eligible for naturalisation to 6 years or whether that was just an unintended consequence of the tinkering with the legislation is a good question.
The previous government had lots of complicated plans for naturalisation, such as "earned citizenship" and "provisional citizenship", all of which now seem to have been consigned to the dustbin of history — at least, we can hope so.